There was no bright light or Shintō god that entered Sarutadō to take Moya home. She lay there in the dirt, watching over me until her eyes could watch no more. With a final breath, she followed Aiko and Ichiro and Taiki and Yori. The most magical creatures I’d ever known. I hoped that wherever they were, they had found happiness. I hoped Yori was battling Rain Spider somewhere, and that Ichiro was a famous baseball player, and that Taiki was a friendly giant. I hoped Aiko knew that the black birds were finally free and that the three-legged crow would bring her family together again.
I wrapped Moya in my jacket and carried her small body out of Sarutadō. We walked through the cattails and the camphor trees for the last time. Moya was my protector spirit. The Tengu Road had almost taken me, but she had saved me. From myself—the most dangerous thing in that cave.
At times I still feel the Road, pulling at the edges of my mind like a hole in space, but then I remember Moya. I remember the festival, and the kaki tree, and the kiss in front of the cave. It helps me breathe the numbness out and let the light back in.
* * *
A week and a half later I returned to school. The students ran back and forth, totally unaware of the other lives this town had claimed. With Kōtenbō’s illusion broken, Shimizu-sensei woke up unharmed in the last car of the 9:00 a.m. train to Sakawa. He never returned to the high school. Or to the town he risked everything to escape.
I wish I could say Ikeda-sensei walked out of Sarutadō and became a famous sumō wrestler. Or a well-known baseball coach. Or even a functioning human being. He survived the vulture attack, which was good. But his brain was so scrambled he barely remembered the past year. Which was not so good.
After returning from the hospital, Nobu Ikeda spent most of his days sitting on the front steps of his house, staring out over the rice fields that had long since turned brown and dry. He doesn’t answer when I ride by. He doesn’t even look up.
The school told everyone Ikeda-sensei fell while exploring the abandoned caverns. Which didn’t make sense to anyone. Spelunking sumō wrestlers is not a thing. I think Ikeda-sensei is just trying to unwind the damage Kōtenbō did to his mind. Maybe he’ll work it out and return to school. Or maybe he’ll just watch rice fields, happy that he’s finally free from his father’s control.
My first day back to school was like any other day before this all started. The first-years chased each other through the halls, the third-years talked about movies and TV games and J-pop stars. Toriyama-sensei gave us composition homework. Kenji attacked his lunch like a wood chipper attacks a tree.
“Slow down there, kid,” I said. “That salmon didn’t do anything to you.”
“Did you call me ‘kid’? Baka. I’m bigger than you. And where’s your helmet, anyway?”
“In a trash can somewhere, probably. I don’t know. Besides, I don’t need it anymore.”
“Why not?”
“Because sometimes people get better, Kenji. With the help of good friends, they get better.”
“What in the hell are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about being a pilot. I’m going to be a stunt pilot and fly all over Japan.”
“Yeah, well, stunt pilots still wear helmets, genius.”
“Shut up, Kenji,” I said, picking up my salmon with a smile.
It was a totally normal, uneventful, fantastic day. And just like I always had, I rode out to Lawson’s to meet Haru after school.
“Hey, Fly-Boy,” Haru said.
“Thank you! I knew it would catch on. And I appreciate that you are saying it and not some voice in my head.”
“Gods, you are weird,” Haru said.
I thought Shibaten might be a little peeved about the whole smashing him in the head with a baseball bat. But the day after Kōtenbō’s defeat, my parents returned home, refreshed from their Kyōtō vacation. I guess Shibaten had to admit things turned out pretty well for him. Even if a fox almost bit his leg off.
“Are we going to the tree?” Haru asked.
“Let’s do it,” I said.
Haru jumped on the back of my bike, still dressed in a fine black suit. The cast on his leg wasn’t slowing him down. He looked better than he had in a long time.
“How did the interview go?” I asked as we rode along.
“Hard to tell, you know. But I was really enthusiastic.”
Haru had decided Kusaka Town wasn’t that bad after all and applied for the vacant position in the town hall accounting office. He had no qualifications whatsoever, but it was a better plan than sitting around in a parking lot all day.
“Well, enthusiasm counts for something,” I said. “It doesn’t really outweigh, you know, job experience or a college degree or basic competence, but it counts for something.”
“Baka,” he said.
“I’m glad you’re back,” I told him.
“I didn’t go anywhere,” he said.
I smiled and pedaled faster.
* * *
I’d buried Moya Okita under the fallen branches of the kaki tree.
Okita.
No one should leave this life without a last name, right? Without a family name? Moya was part of my family now, so I thought she should have mine.
I looked at the broken trunk surrounded by new shoots of green. One day there would be a forest of kaki trees in this place. A persimmon tree is a very strange kind of tree. It looks so weak on the outside. So fragile. So odd. But there is great power in a kaki tree. Moya sensed it. And for some crazy reason, she sensed it in me, too.
In a dark cave beneath Kusaka Town, Moya pushed me off the Tengu Road. She helped me see the world as it actually is. A place of pain, but also a place of hope. Of despair, but also joy. Of fear, but unforgettable love.
I turned her silver barrette over and over in my hand. It was our akai ito, our red string reaching from one end of the sky to the next. From the moon to the oceans to the highest mountains. “When you love someone, you are never really lost to them,” she had told me. “No matter what happens in life, focus on that instead of the sadness or the pain. I will be with you, Koda. I will be watching. Our akai ito will always help me find you again.”
It’s something I hope for every day.
Haru hobbled up beside me and reached into his pocket. He pulled out a cucumber, took a bite, and offered it to me.
“I’m good, thanks.”
“I can’t get enough of these stupid things,” he said, chomping into it again. “It’s kind of freaking me out.”
I guess Shibaten hadn’t completely forgiven me for the baseball bat.
Haru looked over at me and said, “Girls, am I right? They’ll kiss you one day and then run off to Tōkyō to … Why did you say Moya left?”
“To be a scientist.”
“Yesterday it was a model.”
“To be a scientist and a model,” I said.
“Before that it was deep-sea diving.”
“A scientist and a model and a diver. She can do all three. She can do anything.”
Haru took a loud bite of his cucumber and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “It’s okay, man. Everyone gets their heart broken. But it’ll all work out in the end.”
I slipped the silver barrette back into my pocket.
“Yeah,” I said. “I know it will.”
I bowed to Moya’s resting place and then walked away from the last kaki trees in Kusaka Town.